Sunday, May 14, 2017

Sad to say, but the millennial generation has become
something of a joke. Members of that generation misbehave so consistently that
they have lent themselves to withering caricatures.

One understands—because one is nothing if not understanding—that
the fault lies with their parents and the school system. That is, with whoever
failed to teach them manners. I will add that they are the products of parents
and teachers who imagined that their primary task was not to educate, not to
help build character, but to do therapy. That is to shower their children with empty
praise, never to criticize them, never to correct their faults and to allow
them the freest unconstrained expression.

Anyway, this generation needs help. And it needs good
advice. Under the circumstances we are naturally inclined to turn to the Daily
Mail. This time the paper does not disappoint. In a William Hanson column it lays down the proper markers.

Describing this group as entitled and
self-aggrandizing, Hanson offers some guidelines for the world of work… which
some of us consider to be the real world.

He begins with a lesson in hierarchy. Since millennials
believe in equality, they do not understand hierarchy. They think that they are
as good as they think they are. They insist that everyone else agree. So, they never learned to respect authority or to practice deference.

Hanson begins:

Know
your place!

You may
have been captain of the rugby team at school, a pretty big deal with your
university’s social committee; your parents may be oozing with pride for you,
but, millennials, when you join a firm in a graduate position you are bottom of
the pile.

Get
used to it or get out.

Next… millennials have mastered the art of communicating in
incoherent text messages. They need need to put down their iPhones and raise their tired eyes… to look another human being in the eye. That will put them on the road to learning the art of conversation, of speaking to someone face to
face:

The
millennial generation have grown up with technology at their fingertips and are
skilfully adept at holding conversations via Whatsapp, iMessage and email. When
it comes to interfacing with human beings in the flesh, where communiques from
one’s lips cannot be edited before emitting, they struggle.

To
truly excel above the (hopefully) friendly competition of your peers know when
to turn off the buzzing mobile and step away from the slavish keyboard.

Want to
make your clients feel special and wanted? Ring them to arrange your next
meeting, send a hand-written thank you note after you attend one of their
events, and don’t look at your phone once when you get together.

We can call it the human dimension. Treat other people like
human beings and you will profit.

Hanson then mentions that you should constrain your wish to
gossip, to repeat what others have said, to talk trash about other people. When
someone confides in you, keep what they say in confidence. If you don’t you are
showing that you cannot be trusted. And you are showing that you are in it for
the entertainment, not for the business:

Office
‘banter’ is not a human right.

Camaraderie
in an office is healthy – it helps bond a team – but this is not an extended
stag do, or a night out with ‘the girls’. Keep the banter dial turned down to
low. Or to off: off is an option, too.

It’s all about decorum and propriety. Precious few millennials have been taught such skills, but they have not disappeared. They should begin by getting over themselves. They will advance when they learn how important it is to care about other people.

11 comments:

If the Millennials get their way in their work places then reality will come knocking and the work places will just go away and they will have no place to go. No organized business can succeed under the millennial's ideas of how it's done. Which of course throws them right back into the arms of the government and us subsidizing their existence, which of course as we are told constantly is a "right".I don't want to sound like an old fuddy duddy and I know many of the same arguments could be made by the horse and buggy crowd about young people in their day, but this is different.

Stuart: The millennial generation have grown up with technology at their fingertips and are skilfully adept at holding conversations via Whatsapp, iMessage and email. When it comes to interfacing with human beings in the flesh, where communiques from one’s lips cannot be edited before emitting, they struggle.

A very good point, although the quality of asynchronous communication in emails isn't necessarily low. That's a choice.

And for in-the-flesh I'd suggest Toastmasters, if you want to polish your ability to speak and think on your feet, and express leaderships in organization.http://www.toastmasters.org/

Much cheaper than management schools, even if the certificates of achievement are not necessarily signs of competence.

But if we want the ultimate antirole model for Millennials, surely our Commander-and-Tweet, the ultimate entitled and self-aggrandizing muddled thinker.

I don't know Sam. I think it's going to have to take big bad nasty reality to do the job. One of the things that has struck me about the Millennials and the high tech barons is their very odd faith in a strange jumble of tech/government for the resolution of some of life's deepest mysteries. This is sort of getting into Ignatius's territory, but remember about a year ago the talk from the high techies about life extension and the possibility of immortality. When you here people talking like that they've really cut loose from reality and are in for a big surprise. Well I've blabbed enough already. Millennials would just quit the services (if the standards are not relaxed). They don't realized that the majority of wealth created by the new tech has been for socializing. Their devices (and themselves) cannot fix anything, they can call for a repairman, but one has to answer. To the stool of silence!

I don't know Sam, I went through army back in the days of muzzle loaders. I do remember the Drill Sgts for some reason had very little interest in my personal problems. They probably had never gone through diversity and micro aggression training.It was the first and only time I experienced levitation. With all my gear I found myself suddenly in the back of a cattle truck. Other recruits claimed a drill sgt had kicked my rear end up into the truck. It was a scientific marvel.